The Fifty Seventh Republic - the joy of bank holiday marking

[StaffRepFeistyClub]

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. It is meant for school staff only – a sort of room of requirement. Baiters, haters, goaders, and bashers can jog on somewhere else.

If you are NOT staff and just have a general education query please start your own thread.

Do not give the staffroom password to non-staff as it attracts the wrong sort of crowd.

Other requirements for staff room entry include the ability to find the staff room, the ability to find a clean mug in the staff room, knowledge of the photocopier codes, and the ability to sniff out where the booze is stashed - Thirsty Tuesdays, Fizz Fridays now in operation. Do not sit on the chairs and do wear a mask

Feel your pain, Beachhuts
When we do leave the zones behind it's going to be a shock to the Reception children though, to find the hulking great year 6s in the same place as them. Our playground is large and we have good outside space, but a y6 boy whamming a football into the face of a yR child happens far too often.

YYY to getting groups in the classroom not the lines of tables. I have permanent bruises on legs and toes from squuezing between to mark books, have chair legs dropped onto my feet etc.

@HairyMaclary we’ve had a couple sit at home under exam conditions (obvs we know who sat at home and whether that would affect Mark/if we trust those parents) others have done later in school. Depended on circumstances/family/how long they’d be off.

Think in your position we’d wait for test results....

Sorry to be clear as a school we’d wait for PCR result then decide what to do.

If students miss assessments for us they are not resitting as they are are sitting 3 assessments per subject and coupled with their work throughout Yr 10 this should give us a healthy bank of evidence.

@Beachhuts90 Why aren’t TAs getting a break? Ours have a break either before or after usual break time if they are on duty that day. They always without fail get their 20 mins in the morning and half an hour at lunch, plus can go to the loo whenever they need to.

It’s teachers at our school that are bearing the brunt of bubble supervision, because I guess you can be more flexible with salaried employees when you need extra cover? I don’t know, maybe it’s the only way round it at the moment without paying a load of overtime to hourly employees...

I still wish they’d have been given study leave - am exhausted! We haven’t even been given a date when Yr 11/13 are leaving. They keep asking me - as if I know! We’re assuming half term but there are events on the calendar pencilled in for them after half term. I really don’t want them here to summer. How are we supposed to do all the stuff we usually do in our ‘gained’ time and teach them (absolutely nothing as all assessments sat by half term)?!

[quote Timeturnerplease]@Beachhuts90 Why aren’t TAs getting a break? Ours have a break either before or after usual break time if they are on duty that day. They always without fail get their 20 mins in the morning and half an hour at lunch, plus can go to the loo whenever they need to.

It’s teachers at our school that are bearing the brunt of bubble supervision, because I guess you can be more flexible with salaried employees when you need extra cover? I don’t know, maybe it’s the only way round it at the moment without paying a load of overtime to hourly employees...[/quote]
I do sometimes nip to the loo before the kids have lunch if my 1:1 is ok. I just feel bad doing it, you know? In the 3 minutes I'm gone anything can go wrong with her. I'm not sure if TAs in other bubbles have breaks but ours don't really, although our HLTA this term is really good about alerting us when there's cake in the staff room ❤️

I might have brought it up if I could see another way to do it but the way it is, someone has to not have a break duty off, and I'm the newest hire (and leaving for school direct after July) so it's not really worth making a fuss. Apparently it was all way easier before covid! I get 30 minutes off for lunch in my contract so I'm not working more than I should.

[quote Timeturnerplease]@Beachhuts90 Why aren’t TAs getting a break? Ours have a break either before or after usual break time if they are on duty that day. They always without fail get their 20 mins in the morning and half an hour at lunch, plus can go to the loo whenever they need to.

It’s teachers at our school that are bearing the brunt of bubble supervision, because I guess you can be more flexible with salaried employees when you need extra cover? I don’t know, maybe it’s the only way round it at the moment without paying a load of overtime to hourly employees...[/quote]
My former head was always keen to point out:

• the morning break is not for staff and all staff are paid to work it (her excuse for giving us all mandatory playtime "clubs" to run outside every single day),
• teachers are only entitled to a 20min lunch in law (her excuse for making teachers supervise their classes eating in the hall).

Note: she used to take extended morning breaks of at least half an hour and then often go out for lunch with the non-teaching deputy for at least an hour.

I used to work for a complete arse

Oof, at least our head takes on break duties! In another bubble but the same time as ours

With a high temp we'd require a PCR test. We'd wait for the results before deciding what to do. Obviously a negative result would mean coming in to do the rest of the exams and catching up on any they missed. A positive result would give us a bit more to think about, but if the child is well in themselves they may be allowed to sit them at home, depending how trustworthy they are. Or they may have to have their own personal exam weeks once they are released from isolation and are back at school.

Wait for pcr test. They’re being very blasé about safety telling you to send them in. Easier to catch up one student then have a whole class forced to isolate surely?

Non teaching day today but need to go in and get the cover sorted for the lesson I’m going to miss tomorrow for my jab and promised I’d hunt for some awol textbooks yesterday but ran out of time and steam after staying in my last classroom for an hour to catch up with marking. So I’ll time it for the staggered breaks to be able to search classrooms.

I’m getting annoyed at reading in the news that students don’t need to wear masks anymore but that staff do, in communal areas where social distancing can’t be maintained such as staffrooms.

Staffrooms? Not corridors or classrooms but staffrooms? Can’t even remember what ours looks like.

Iamnotthe1
They sound like an arse. Our SLT are all on regular duties, and all but the head still teach, including exam classes.

Our head is always out on duty. Ditto the DH and AHTs. Everyone including DHT has a teaching load and the head has covered my lesson before (she's amazing!)

My HoD on the other hand is fulfilling the arse role brilliantly. It's way too outing to go into but suffice to say my patience and empathy are running out

Just heard Scottish update and masks are for now still staying but will be reviewed.
Relieved.
My happiest news today has been that giraffes have arrived in the local zoo 🦒🦒

My hod looks done in. I'm discovering that's she's not great with change or disruption and therefore trying to keep an open mind about some of the more chaotic/difficult issues this year as maybe she is excellent in normal times.

I've just been into school on non teaching day to try and hunt for missing textbooks - incredibly weird because it's a 'zone' and only two classrooms within it are used for my subject so where the hell can they have gone to? I've searched the whole floor in case they've ended up being used as a door jam and migrated into the wrong room.

Got caught in torrential rain on the way home but have got my cover work and resources in the classes book box ready to go so even if things go wrong at the hod, cover manager and/or supply teacher level the work is there. Last time I came back to find none of my, carefully prepared and deliberately perfect for non specialist cover, lessons actually made it to the supply teacher and therefore a whole lesson had been wasted.

I'm only going to miss my first lesson whilst getting my jab and a very helpful girl in that class always dives in the cupboard to get their book box and start giving things out so even if the entire professional body fails she'll get it sorted.

I feel fairly sure I know what I'm doing tomorrow and everything is sorted. Another one of those things that people who don't teach don't get - a quick medical appointment can require a hell of a lot of work and prep even if you're lucky enough to be allowed to attend.

She absolutely was an arse. She did much worse than that though. Her best move was when she disappeared for a week during term, telling us it was a 5 day Ofsted readiness course and we were not to contact her. She turned up the following Monday with a glorious natural tan...

Oh but I had to try and smile and not be offended yesterday when I asked how options numbers were looking for ks4 next year and she said they're down because their have been staff changes (I am the staff change). So far as I'm aware from talking to my year 8s and parents evening etc a really high proportion of mine are taking the subject for GCSE. She sort of then went on to say oh it always happens whenever someone goes on maternity leave or we have a new teacher or etc etc.

Would I be a wanker to ask to see the list of who has chosen it and work out for myself what percentage of my students had chosen it and compare to the department as a whole? I have honestly done great with my year 8s this year full stop let alone considering the circumstances and how mediocre year 8 progress looks across the department compared to my groups. Perhaps I am a wanker but I like to see the data and monitor my own performance and how I've done.

Beachhuts, that sounds bad re. duties. How has it ended up that you're doing more than the other TAs?

Hope everyone is ok today. The sun is shining in between the showers, and I had a lovely walk into school with two of the dc. Was nice to hear them chatting rubbish to each other and I managed to embarrass the youngest with a big smooch at the gate .

(We're going to need a new thread soon).

@TheHoneyBadger exactly what I am doing. The impact on our kids and staff of our current situation is huge, far reaching and long term.

I want to know how many GCSE and A level kids are coming out of each class.

I've emailed asking if there's somewhere I can see the list of year 8s who have chosen history Arnott. It's only by accident I found the way to compare my groups progress with the rest of the groups in that year group and discovered my groups are doing well comparatively. If we have to contribute to all this bloody data at least I should be able to access it and use it.

Yup, sounds familiar.
I'm looking forward to it because I know damn well take-up from my classes is very good.

I'm applying for UPS next year and yes I'll be pointing out the percentage of my classes that made above expected progress, numbers who chose GCSE etc even if that isn't a narrative anyone in my department wants to acknowledge.

I do two playground duties, and am on first aid for the others. I usually manage 15 mins to clean the tables, eat lunch, pee and clean the tables again before the children come back. All the dinner ladies are TAs too, but they get a protected 30 min break, either before ore after the official lunch time.